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■ CB 155 
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HUMAN 



PROGRESS. 



Is* 



BY 






1 



JOSEPH BARKER 




WM. COL FOURTH ST. 

1858. 



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I 



CB» 



HUMAN PROGRESS 

By 
JOSEPH BARKER. 



There are three opinions with regard to human affairs : 

1. The first, that they are continually getting worse. 

2. The second, that they are stationary. 

3. The third, that they are evermore progressing or im- 
proving. 

1. The first opinion is the most ancient. We find it in 
the oldest writings that have come down to our times. The 
Poets of Greece and Rome, sing of a time when men were 
all healthy and strong, virtuous and happy, and lived, with- 
out care and without pain, to a good old age, — a time when 
the oppressive heat of summer, and the terrible rigors o 
winter were alike unknown, and when the earth yielded 
without culture, whatever was needful to the support and 
comfort of her children. We meet with similar representa- 
tions in the Poets and Fabulists of other nations. .Ml sing 
the praises of the past, and lament the degeneracy of the 
present. 

The same opinion, somewhat modified, is entertained by 
numbers at the presenl day. We meel with men both in 

the old world and tin- now, who think there are no men 
now, either in church or state, to he compared with lie 

worthies of other days. Their forefathers were giants, both 

7 



intellectually and morally, compared with us ; and we are 
but pigmies compared with them. 

2. The opinion that things are stationary is not so ancient ; 
yet we meet with it in writings of great antiquity. It is 
advocated by one of the speakers in the Book of Ecclesias- 
tes. "The thing that hath been," says he, "is that which 
shall be; and that which is done, is that which shall be 
done, and there is no new thing under the sun." We meet 
with the same sentiment in the Roman Poet Manlius. 

"The world is still the same, and still the same shall be : 
That which our Grandsires saw, our Sons shall see." 

And still we meet with men who regard all hopes of 
better days as fallacious, and all schemes or efforts for the 
elevation of our race as visionary. " You cannot alter the 
nature of man," say they, "or change essentially the state 
of society." 

3. The doctrine of Progress is comparatively modern, 
and is regarded by many with suspicion and dread. Yet 
it has many friends, and their number is daily increasing. 
It ranks among its disciples and advocates the best and 
noblest spirits of the age. Our leading Philosophers and 
Statesmen acknowledge its truth, and employ their talents 
and influence in its favor. The most active spirits among 
all classes, in every civilized nation, are making the doc- 
trine of Progress the leading article of their creed. It has 
won the hearts of our sweetest poets, and through its in- 
spirations they have enriched our literature, with a number 
of the most touching and enchanting melodies that ever 
cheered or charmed the heart of man. 

Railing their voices in a chant sublime, 
They sing the glories of the coming time, 
When error shall decay, and truth grow strong, 
And right shall reign supreme, and vanquish wrong. 

There may be a difference of opinion among us as to which 
of these three doctrines is the true one, but there can be 
none as to which is the most cheering. The doctrine that 



all things are going to decay, — that vice and misery are 
continually increasing and destined to go on increasing, is 
truly dismal ; and the doctrine that things are to be forever 
stationary, is not much better. The doctrine of progress, 
on the contrary, is full of hope and joy and consolation. 

Nor will there be any difference of opinion among us as 
to which of these doctrines is the most beneficial in its in- 
fluence on man's heart and character. It is plain that the 
influence of the two first cannot be otherwise than injurious. 
Their tendency is to chill the noblest affections of man's 
nature, and to convert the patriot and philanthropist into 
a useless, moody, melancholy croaker. "What inducement 
has a man to try to improve his garden, if he believe that 
in spite of all his efforts, it will still remain the same, or get 
continually worse. And so with regard to the great politi- 
cal and social garden of our country and the world. If a 
man beleive that, do what he may, the character and condi- 
tion of his country and his kind, can never be improved, 
what encouragement has he to do any thing? But if a man 
believe that his efforts to promote the improvement and 
welfare of His country and his kind will be successful, — 
that tho' they may not accomplish all he could wish, they 
will still accomplish something ; and that what the labors 
and sacrifices of one age do not accomplish, the labors and 
sacrifices of a succeeding age will, he can labor with com- 
fort and spirit. Our wish is to see every man a patriot 
and a philanthropist. The patriot and the philanthropist, 
enlightened and guided by true science, is the noblest 
character underheaven. And nothing, we imagine, is better 
calculated to make men patriots and philanthropists, than 
a hearty belief in the doctrine of eternal progress. If then 
the doctrine be true, we ought to know it? If there be f:ic\± 
demonstrating its truth, we ought to be acquainted with 
them. Our conviction ia that there arc such lads, in infin- 
ite abundance; and our purpose is to point out a few of 
them in the present lecture. 



And first, there is in man a natural tendency to progress. 
There are principles in human nature, which render the 
progress of our race a matter of certainty. 

1. There is, for instance, in man, a natural desire for 
knowledge, — for knowledge without hounds. This desire 
for knowledge increases in strength the more it is gratified. 
It grows with what it feeds on. This insatiable desire for 
knowledge impels men to all kinds of experiments, and these 
experiments lead continually to new discoveries, to perpetual 
progress, in every department of science. 

2. Again ; man's poiver to acquire knowledge, as well as 
his desire for knowledge, increases with his efforts to acquire 
it. The mind, like the body, is strengthened by exercise. 
The understanding, the judgment, the imagination and the 
memory are all invigorated by use, and better fitted for 
penetrating the secrets of nature, and unravelling the mys- 
teries of the universe. 

3. Then every discovery prepares the way for further 
discoveries, and makes further discoveries more easy. It is 
with knowledge as it is with money : the man that has no 
money, finds it hard to get any, especialljA. times like 
these ; while the man that has plenty, finds it easy to get 
more. So a man that knows nothing, finds it hard to learn 
anything ; while the man that knows a great deal, finds it 
easy to learn a great deal more. 

4. Again, knowledge, like light, is pleasant, while igno- 
rance, like darkness, is disagreeable ; and the pleasures of 
knowledge, which, unlike so many other pleasures, never 
cloy, will lure man onward in search of knowledge, and 
render still more sure the progress of our race. 

5. Then knowledge is infinitely useful. Knowledge is 
power. It gives man dominion over the universe. Know- 
ledge is wealth. It not only discovers the treasures of the 
earth and the sea, but reveals to him the uses of things, 
?nd enables him to turn them to his advantage. Jt turns all 
nature into wealth. Knowledge is virtue. It reveals to 
man his duty ; unfolds to him the results of obedience, 



weakens the power of temptations to transgression, and 
thus enables and disposes him to pursue a course of life in 
accordance with the requirements of virtue and honor. 
Knowledge is health. It reveals to man the laws of life, and 
enables him to avoid a thousand dangers to which his un- 
enlightened neighbors fall. Knowledge tends to improve 
man's character, and to better his condition in every respect. 
And the more clearly man sees this, the more eager will 
he become to make continual progress in knowledge. 

6. Then there is in man a desire for consistency, for har- 
mony in his views. "When he discerns a great truth, he natu- 
rally tries to reconcile it with his previous views. If he can- 
not, he casts his old opinions aside. He cannot rest till his 
mind is at case with itself. Thus every truth expels old errors, 
and prepares the way for the entrance of other truths. 

7. All sciences are intimately related, and mutually de- 
pendent on each other, so that a man cannot properly under- 
stand one, without a knowledge of several others. A know- 
ledge of History requires a knowledge of Geography, and a 
knowledge of Geography a knowledge of Meteorology and 
AstronomA^A knowledge of Medicine, requires a know- 
ledge of Pfiysiology and Chemistry, Astronomy requires a 
knowledge of Mathematics and Geometry. Thus one study 
necessitates another, and the more a man learns, the more 
it is necessary for him to learn. Hence, when man has 
once given himself to the pursuit of science, he is compelled 
evermore to advance ; and the farther he advances, the 
farther he desires to advance. 

8. Again, man is never long contented with his condition. 
However well he may he satisfied when he first experiences 
the pleasures and advantages of Borne great and happy 
change, he BOOn begins to wish for something better or for 
something more. Clergymen may preach contentment as 
long and as hard as they please, men cannot be content, and 
they ought not if they could. Novelty, change, is essen- 
tia] to the enjoyment of life; and the desire for novelty, the 



6 

eternal longing after something better, is another principle 
that tends to secure the progress of our race. 

9. Then there is in man a principle of emulation. Life is a 
race, and no one likes to be last. Many are anxious to be 
first, or even with the first. Our neighbor builds a better 
house, and we must have one as good. His wife gets better 
furniture, and ours must do the same. And so it is in 
science, Herschel discovers a new planet, and a thousand 
astronomers scan the heavens eager to discover another — a 
second. Kepler detects a new law of the planetary system, 
and all his cotemporaries try to discover another. And so 
in the arts, trade, and politics. There is always some one 
bent on being first, and there are always others unwilling to 
be second. It is the same with States. All vie with each 
other in population, wealth and power, and the more ad- 
vanced States, emulate each other in science, arts and free- 
dom. And this principle of emulation necessitates still 
farther the progress of our race. 

10. Again, man has a strong desire to have his children, 
and his children's children, virtuous and happy. And the 
longer he lives, the more clearly he sees that he^pnot secure 
the virtue and happiness of his own offspring, except so far as 
he can secure the virtue and happiness of the coming gen- 
erations at large. He sees, he feels, if one man is to be happy, 
men generally must be happy; that if we neglect the virtue 
and happiness of others, we sacrifice our own. His wish, 
therefore, to secure the health, the virtue, the peace, the 
safety, and the happiness of his offspring, prompts him to 
labor for the improvement and welfare of the world at large. 

11. And further, there is in man a principle of benevo- 
Tence, of philanthropy, which impels him to seek the happi- 
ness of mankind at large on their own account, as well as out 
of regard to the welfare of his offspring. We are aware that 
this principle is weaker in some than in others, and that in 
many it is overpowered and neutralized by inferior propen- 
sities. Still, it is implanted in all, and in some it is the 



ruling power, controling their whole life. And those nobler 
specimens of humanity are sufficiently numerous and suffi- 
ciently powerful to shape the future destiny of our race. 

We observe further, that we have progressed in the past. 
We have progressed in science ; we have progressed in arts ; 
we have progressed in religion ; we have progressed in every 
thing conducive to the security and happiness of life. 

1. We have progressed in science. We have progressed 
in Astronomical science. The knowledge of the ancients 
with regard to the heavens was very limited. They had 
observed the stars, the few which could be seen by the 
naked eye, and had discovered, that a few of them had an 
appearance and a motion different from the* rest. They had 
also noticed the peculiar appearance and unusual move- 
ments of those mysterious bodies which occasionally come 
within sight, called comets. But beyond this, all that went 
under the name of Astronomy or Astrology, was a mass of 
childish fancies and delusions. The majority of the an- 
cients believed that the stars were living bodies, animated 
by living souls, and many of them worshiped them as gods. 
Comets dj;fc|garded as frightful omens, foreboding pesti- 
lence anSr.|ff An eclipse of the sun or moon would in- 
spire wholdfciations with the wildest terrors. The stars 
were supposed to have a mysterious and irresistible influ- 
ence over a person's character and destiny, and a numerous 
order of men imposed upon the people, and enriched them- 
selves, by pretending to derive from an observation of the 
6tars, a knowledge of future events. The ancient Hebrews 
believed that the sun and moon and stars were fixed in a 
solid frame-work, called the firmament, and that they were 
all at an equal distanec from the earth. The apparent dif- 
ference of size in the heavenly bodies they believed to be 
real. They considered the earth the principal part of (lie 
universe, and looked on all the hosts of heaven as created 
for the service of its inhabitants. They believed the earth 
was stationary, resting on pillars or foundations that could 



8 

never be moved. In shape they supposed it to be a square, 
hence they speak continually of its length and breadth, and 
of its four corners. The difference in the motions oi the 
planets and the stars led at length to the belief in several 
concentric firmaments, or spheres, moving within each 
other, at different rates of speed; but their new conjectures, 
instead of rendering their theory of the heavens more 
intelligible, made it more incomprehensible. 

What is the state of Astronomical science now ? Where 
the ancients saw one star, we, by the aid of the telescope, 
see a hundred or a thousand. Where they saw nothing 
more than stars, we see countless suns and solar systems. 
The motions of the heavens, which to them were inexplica- 
ble, are now made intelligible to a child. Their four-cor- 
nered earth we have made into a sphere, and instead of 
keeping it immoveable, we make it spin on its axis at the 
rate of a thousand miles an hour, all day and all night 
long, and find time beside, with the moon fcr its companion, 
to take a yearly journey round the sun, at the rate of sixty- 
six thousand miles an hour. We have incre^^d the num- 
ber of the planets more than five fold, and» n to each 
its task and its sphere ; while to some ofjBP principal 
ones we have assigned a number of secondary planets as 
attendants. By the improvements in Mathematics and 
Geometry, and the invention of the telescope and its accom- 
paniments, our modern Astronomers have measured the 
distances of the planets from the sun, and from each other, 
ascertained the laws of their motions, defined their orbits, 
determined their size, their solid contents, and their com- 
parative density, with a certainty and an exactness truly 
astonishing. By means of books, maps, diagrams, globes 
and planetariums, they have made these, and a thousand 
other discoveries more astonishing still, familiar to vast 
multitudes, and placed them within the reach of mankind 
at large. The discovery of astronomical truth, has exploded 
artronomical error. It has dissipated the maddening and 



9 

mischievous delusions of astrology, and brought into gen- 
eral discredit the old black art of fortune-telling. It has 
taught us to look on the phenomena of the heavens without 
terror or anxiety. We no longer see a harbinger of death 
or desolation in the comet, or a sign of coming troubles in 
an eclipse. We welcome the lonely w r anderers thro' im- 
mensity, as harmless and interesting visitors, and court a 
further acquaintance with them. We look with as little fear 
on an eclipse of the sun or moon, as on the shades of even- 
ing. We know their course, we foretell their coming, and 
gaze on them with pleasure. It is in the darkness of igno- 
rance and error, that men are agitated and tortured with 
wild and unnatural terrors; the day-light of science shows 
us that the ghosts and goblins, that startled us in the dark, 
are in truth our benefactors and our friends. 

We have made progress in Geographical knowledge; 
The ancients knew almost as little of the earth as of the 
heavens. They had no idea of its extent, or of the number 
and variety of its inhabitants. To the ancient Jews, the 
land they lived in, and a few neighboring countries, w T ere 
"the whflfl ■fid," and their inhabitants. " all the nations 
of the eaim ^Even the Greeks and Romans were ignorant 
of much thl*greater part of the earth; — ignorant, not only 
of its various climates, productions and inhabitants, but of 
its very existence. Of the two great continents of North 
and South America, of the continent of Australia, of num- 
erous and vast inhabited regions in Asia and Africa, and 
even of many and extensive regions in Europe, as well as 
of a thousand Islands scattered in the Seas, they knew just 
nothing. Alexander was said to have conquered the world, 
yet neither he nor his Generals ever taw, much less con- 
quered, one tenth of it. The Romans fancied themselves the 
rulers of the world, while hundreds of nations roamed the 
foresU or inhabited the cities of as many lands, wholly un- 
conscious of the existence of the proud conquerors. The 
Romans did not know much even of some of the countries 



10 

over which their empire extended. It is amusing to read the 
monstrous accounts which Procopius, an able historian of 
the reign of Justinian, gives of Britain, some hundreds of 
years after its conquest by the Komans. "There is one 
province of the Island," says this historian, "where the 
ground is covered with serpents, and the air is such, that 
no man can inhale it and live. To this desolate region the 
spirits of the departed are ferried over from the land of the 
Franks, at midnight. A strange race of fishermen perform 
the ghastly office, the speech of the dead is distinctly heard 
by the boatmen: their forms are invisible to the mortal 
eye ; but their weight makes the keel sink deep in the 
water." *The Romans had as foolish and ridiculous 
notions, and gave credit to as monstrous fables, with re- 
gard to other foreign countries. They believed in races 
of men of prodigious size and monstrous shapes. They 
spoke of harpies, griffins, gorgons, hydras, sirens, nymphs, 
satyrs, and other monstrous creations of a disordered im- 
agination, as real beings. And this mad mass of miscon- 
ceptions, with some few particles of science int ermingled, 
was the Geography of the ancients, 

What is the Geography of the moderns^^Within the 
last century, our voyagers have repeatedly made the circuit 
of the globe, exploring every Sea, and almost every Bay. 
Our travellers have made their way over every continent, 
and explored almost every Island, climbing mountains, 
crossing deserts, penetrating forests, exploring volcanoes, 
tracing the courses of rivers, noting peculiarities of climate, 
acquainting themselves with a thousand varieties of birds 
and beasts, insects and reptiles, shrubs and trees, fruits and 
flowers, and with the leading characteristics of all the races 
of men by which the earth is peopled. The errors of earlier 
explorers have been corrected by the researches of later 
ones, and discovery has followed discovery, until we are at 
length in possession of information so vast in its extent, 
and so reliable in its character, that compared with it, the 



11 

Geography of our ancestors looks poor and pitiful indeed. 
There is hardly a mountain of any note, of which we have 
not measured the height, hardly a sea, of any extent, of 
which we have not sounded the depth, hardly a river of any 
importance, of which we have not traced the length. The 
soil and climate, the vegetables and animals, the geological 
formation and mineral treasures, the human inhabitants, 
with their institutions, laws, religions, customs, traditions, 
literature, of every country, are rapidly coming to light. 
Regions the most difficult of access, presenting to the trav- 
eller dangers the most appalling, have been explored. And 
the march of exploration still goes on. Name a place over 
which doubt or darkness still hangs, and England will furnish 
her Franklin, and America her Kane, who, at the risk of 
life, and of interests dearer than life, will start for the mys- 
terious spot, and either wrench from darkness her secret, or 
nobly perish in the attempt. 

While common Geography presents us with a description 
of the earth's surface, giving us in detail an account of its 
islands and continents, its mountains and valleys, its rivers 
and seas, jfltffcimals and vegetables, &c, there is another 
science, Pineal Geography, which, while it takes note of 
all these details, and explains their relations to each other, 
treats of numerous other territorial phenomena, and unfolds 
the general philosophy of our globe. It treats of the dis- 
tribution of magnetism in our planet, with relation to its 
intensity and direction. , It depicts in broad outlines the 
even or irregular configuration of continents, the relations 
of superficial area, and the distribution of continental masses 
in the two hemispheres, and the influence of this distribution 
on climate, and on the meteorological modifications of the 
atmosphere. It defines the character of mountain chains, 
determines the mean height of continents above the level of 
the sea, the position of the centre of gravity of their volume, 
and the relations of the highest summits of mountain chains, 
to the mean elevation of thoir crests, or to their proximity 



12 

to the sea shore. It considers volcanoes and their action ; 
describes the strife of water with the land ; indicates the 
features possessed in common by all the great rivers in the 
upper and lower portion of their course, and in their mode 
of bifurcation when their basins are enclosed. It speaks of 
currents in the air and ocean, and their influence on climate. 
Explains the difference of climate in islands and continents, 
in continents of different shapes, in different parts of the 
same continent, and in islands of different sizes and positions. 
It designates the latitude or geographical position of the 
zones, or districts, in whose plains each organic form attains 
its highest developement ; shows us organic beings as they 
are distributed in groups throughout the globe, according 
to their different relations of latitude, and elevation above 
the level of the sea, and to climate. In short, it is the phi- 
losophy of all terrestrial phenomena. This science has grown 
to large dimensions, and is every day expanding. For its 
interesting and useful revelations we are entirely indebted to 
the researches of modern philosophers. The ancients hardly 
dreamed of such a science. . 

We have made progress in the iniportantPiBJpces which 
treat of the structure and functions of the human body, of 
the relations in which it stands to external nature, and of 
the laws of life, and health, and happiness. These subjects 
appear to have engaged the attention of the ancients from 
the earliest times, and we have the results of their investi- 
gations in the writings of Hippocrates, Aristotle and Galen. 
The amount of truth, however, to be found in those writings 
is very small, and is mixed with an immense amount of error. 
The ancients had not an opportunity of studying the human 
system to much advantage. It is impossible to gain a know- 
ledge of Anatomy and Physiology without dissection, and to 
the ancients this was forbidden. Among the Jews it was 
unlawful to touch the dead body of a human being. The 
o;iHv Christians considered the dissection of human bodies 
for me purpose of gaining a knowledge of the human 



13 



system, as offensive both to God and man. Tertullian and 
Augustine, two of the leading Fathers of the Church, de- 
nounce those physicians who dissect human bodies for the 
purpose of acquiring physiological and medical knowledge, 
as human butchers and man-haters, and threaten them with 
excommunication and damnation. Even the more philo- 
sophical Greeks and Romans were infected with this mis- 
chievous superstition. The ancient Romans held it unlawful 
to look on the viscera of a dead body, or even to touch the 
dead. The order of men who were employed by them to 
dispose of the dead, were compelled to live outside of the 
city. The Greeks appear to have been somewhat more 
rational, but even they had a tremendous prejudice against 
dissection. When Hippocrates visited Democritus, and 
found him surrounded with the remains of various beasts 
which he was dissecting, he felt it necessary to apologize 
for taking so great a liberty, even with the bodies of animals. 
'•These animals," says he, "which thou secst, I dissect, not 
from any disregard of God, their makeiv : but from a desire 
to find out the nature of the gall and bile. If he was so much 
afraid of censure for dissecting the bodies of beasts,' 1 says 
Harkcwell, "how mcuh greater must his fear of blame have 
been, if lie had been found dissecting the bodies of men.'' 
Hence neither Hippocrates, the most celebrated physician 
among the Greeks, nor Galen, the most renowned physician 
among the Romans, appears ever to have ventured on (his un- 
popular practice. They dissected sheep and dogs, and, to come 
as near to man as they durst, they are said, at times, to have 
jected apes; but superstition, or a dread of popular fury, 
would allow them to go no further. They remained ignorant, 
in consequence, of some of the most simple facts in human 
physiology. The very wisest of them did not even know 
the uumber of bones in the human skeleton. How little then 

must they have known of the veins and arteries, tin 1 muscles 

at) I nerves, ami of the structure and functions <>i the great 

vital organs? The ideas of the ancients with regar ! to the 



14 

causes of diseases were generally fanciful. Some diseases 
they attributed to the Gods, and some to demons ; some to 
the influence of the moon, and others to the influence of the 
stars. ''Hippocrates," says Dr. Lardner, "had so strong a 
faith in the influence of celestial bodies on animated beings, 
that he expressly reccommends that no physician should be 
trusted who is ignorant of astronomy. Galen -agreed with 
Hippocrates, especially with regard to the influence of the 
moon." Madness was attributed to lunar influences exclu- 
sively, hence a madman was called a lunatic, the Latin word 
for moon-struck. Some diseases were charged on witchcraft, 
and others on priestly maledictions. As usual when the intel- 
lect is undeveloped, men imagined causes of natural phenom- 
ena, and generally imagined anything rather than the right 
ones. In early times, men had neither the mental habits, nor 
the freedom from prejudice, nor the opportunities and means, 
necessary to enable them to discover the true causes of natural 
phenomena ; so that if in the writings of the ancients, we 
meet with but little science, and an immense amount of error 
and absurdity, it is exactly what we had reason to expect. 

Men have now outgrown to a great extent the prejudices 
and weaknesses of their ancestors, and acquired the habits 
necessary for scientific investigation. They practise dissec- 
tion withont misgiving, and make experiments without re. 
serve. They shrink from nothing that. promises an increase 
of physiological knowledge, provided it involves no crime 
or cruelty. Their discoveries are, in consequence, innumer- 
able. They have not only numbered with accuracy the bones 
of the human skeleton, but analysed every fibre of the mus- 
cles, traced every ramification of the veins and arteries, and 
almost every filament of the nervous system. They have 
examined the structure, and ascertained the functions, of 
every organ, whether of life, or sense, or motion. While 
some have studied the eye, others have studied the ear. 
While one has given his life to the investigation of the lungs, 
another has spent his days in the examination of the heart, 



15 

and others in observations and experiments on the skin, the 
stomach or the brain. Thousands of men, of the highest in- 
tellectual powers, have for ages past, made the enlargement 
and the diffusion of physiological science, the great object 
and business of their lives. The success which has crowned 
their efforts is as vast as it is cheering. After having gained 
an acquaintance with the heavens and the earth, we have 
gained, at length, thro' their assistance, a better acquaintance 
with ourselves. We know of what we are made, and by what 
we must be sustained. We know to what sources 'we must 
look for health, and from what quarters we may expect dis- 
ease. We understand the relations of our physical system to 
food and drink, to air and exercise, to muscular and mental 
toil, to light and liberty, to pain and pleasure, to society and 
solitude, to varieties of season and climate, to the anxieties 
of gambling and rash speculation, and to the peaceful pur- 
suits of honest industry. We know something of the in- 
fluence of the body over the mind, and of the mind over the 
body. Ten thousand things we know of the human system 
and its relations, of which the wise men of antiquity never 
dreamed. And our knowledge of ourselves is constantly in- 
creasing. Almost every day reveals to us some new wonder, 
and feasts the mind with some new pleasure. . And the 
benefits of this enlargement of physiological science are be- 
ginning to show themselves among all classes. Men and 
women are getting rid of their 'superstitious notions about 
lunar and planetary influences; about the power of witches, 
priests and demons ; as well as of their extravagant expec- 
tations from doctors, drugs and drams. They are learning 
that life and health and enjoyment are more in their own 
power, — that they are governed by natural and unchanging 
laws, and that they arc to be secured by obedience to these 
laws, and by obedience to these laws alone. And many arc 
reducing this knowledge to practice. Hence deadly exces- 
ses of various kinds are giving place to habits of temperance 
and sobriety. Cleanliness is making war on filth. Farmers 



16 

are draining their swamps. Sensible Town Councils are 
suppressing nuisances. Builders are making their houses 
larger, and allowing the inhabitants room to breathe. The 
term of human life is gradually lengthening. Some of the 
deadliest forms of disease are disappearing. Knowledge is 
proving itself to be health and enjoyment, as well as power; 
and under its guidance men are marching, slowly it is true, 
and often irregularly, but still marching, to freedom, to 
virtue and to happiness. 

There is another science, Geology, which treats of the 
natural history of the earth, and seeks, by an examination 
of its crust, to determine questions with regard to its age 
and origin, and the changes through which it has passed. It 
would not be correct to say that in ancient times this science 
had no existence, for there were men two thousand years 
ago, who had made observations and collected important 
facts with regard to the natural history of the earth, which 
really deserved the name of science. The science was, how- 
ever, in its feeblest infancy. The rapid and extensive 
spread of a new superstition peculiarly hostile to scientific 
pursuits, stifled the new-born science for many centuries. 
Of late it has escaped from the hands of its enemy, and been 
nurtured and cherished by its friends, and it has grown and 
expanded in the most wonderful manner. 

The ideas of the ancients with regard to the age, the 
origin, and the natural history of the earth were various, 
and often very ridiculous. Some believed it was made out 
of nothing, about six thousand years ago : others believed it 
to have existed from eternity, in much the same condition 
as that in Avliich we see it at present. Some thought it had 
been made out of water, souie from atoms, and some that it 
had been hatched from a huge egg. All these theories Geo- 
logy has exploded. It has proved that the world lias existed 
for countless millions of ages, — that for an immeasurable 
length of time it had no inhabitants, — that its first inhabi- 
tants were of quite different orders from its present inhabi- 



17 

tants, — that it has been repeatedly peopled by new orders 
of beings, each coming gradually and slowly into existence, 
each occupying the earth for an indefinite but inconceivably 
protracted period, and each passing slowly away, to make 
room for others. Geology has exploded the fables of a 
Golden Age, when the inferior animals were supposed to live 
together in peace, and death to have no existence in the 
earth. It has also revealed to us many facts with regard to 
the inexhaustible mineral treasures with which the crust of 
the earth is fraught, the order in which the various minerals 
are found, the laws of subterranean currents, and a number 
of other important truths tending to promote the happiness 
of mankind. 

The sciences in which the ancients made the greatest pro- 
ficiency, were Mathematics and Geometry ; yet Euclid and 
Archimedes were but children, compared with many of the 
Mathematicians and Geometricians of the present age. 

Another science in which the ancients made considerable 
proficiency was that of Mechanics ; yet the difference be- 
tween the state of Mechanical science among the ancients, 
and the state of that science at the present day, is almost in- 
finite; and the number of useful mechanical inventions at 
present employed in the service of man, compared with the 
number employed by the ancients, is as a thousand to one. 

Some of the ancients devoted much attention to Natural 
History, or to the study of plants and animals ; and consider, 
ing the disadvantages under which they labored, they made 
considerable proficiency in this interesting science. But 
where they were acquainted with one plant or animal, we 
arc acquainted with fifty or a hundred. This is not all. In Na. 
Imal History, as well as in other departments of science, the 
ancients were constantly mixing fables with facts, and crow d- 
ing their catalogues of plants and animals with specimen^ 
which had no existence. Our modern students in Natural 
History, have not only discovered a world of interesting and 
useful facts unknown to the ancients, but have exploded a 



18 

multitude of repulsive and mischievous fictions, by which the 
credulous and superstitious minds of the ancients were 
abused. 

Natural philosophy too, is a department of science in 
which some of the ancients labored considerably, and we 
have the principal results of their researches in the writings 
of Aristotle and Pliny. But what those noble ancients 
really knew of natural philosophy was exceedingly little - 
and as usual, the little truth they discovered was mixed with 
twice or thrice its amount of error. The truth is, the ancients 
did not so much investigate, as imagine; they did not so 
much examine, as believe. They were too much like child- 
ren; and childishness is the leading characteristic, the ap- 
propriate designation, of a great proportion of all they 
have left us, whether on subjects of natural history or 
natural philosophy. Nearly all that we know of Meteor- 
ology, Electricity, Magnetism, Hydrostatics, Pneumatics, 
Optics, and the laws of sound, is the result of investigations 
made by men of the last two centuries. 

And so with regard to chemistry. Nearly all that we know 
of the nature and properties of natural bodies, — of their 
action on each other, — of their constituent elements, — of 
the effects of their decomposition and recombination, and of 
the laws of material substances generally, we owe to the 
labors of the moderns. The ancients supposed there were but 
four elementary bodies, earth, air, fire and water. The mod- 
erns have already discovered from fifty to sixty. They have 
also discovered that what the ancients regarded as elemen- 
tary bodies, are not such. Water thay have found to be a 
compound of oxygen and hydrogen, air a compound of oxygen 
and nitrogen, earth a compound of various elements, and fire 
no element at all, but the result of chemical action in various 
kinds of bodies. Alchemy, to which the ancients gave so 
much attention, and which bore much the same relation to 
Chemistry that Astrology did to Astronomy, the moderns 
have exploded. Its boastful pretensions with regard to the 



19 

discovery of a universal solvent, or philosopher's stone, 
which was to enable them to convert the baser metals into 
gold and silver, and the Elixir vitce, which was to enable 
them to cure and prevent all disease, and secure to man im- 
mortality on earth v are all regarded now as the foolish talk 
of children. Tho' Chemistry has not done all that Alchemy 
pretended to do, it has conferred innumerable benefits on 
mankind. It has aided every other science, promoted the 
improvement of every useful and ornamental art, and con- 
tributed in various ways to the health, the power, the refine- 
ment and the comfort of mankind. 

Philology, or the science which explains the origin of lan- 
guages, their history, the changes they have undergone, their 
relations to each other, and their bearing on the origin and 
history of nations, their religions, customs and laws, is also 
of modern origin. Ethnology, or the science which relates 
to the various races of men, their likenesses and differences, 
their origins and histories, and their settlement in various 
parts of the earth, is the same. And so with almost every 
other science. Nine-tenths, or ninety-nine hundredths, of all 
that we know, whether of ourselves or of nature generally, 
is the result of modern investigation. The marks, the 
signs of progress are on all. 

Again ; we have made progress in matters of government. 
The earliest governments of which we read, were all despotic. 
The king was absolute; his word was law. He disposed of 
the property and lives of his subjects at pleasure. His per- 
son was sacred, for lie was God's anointed ; and to speak 
evil of him, or to resist his power, was death, and damnation 
too. The Greeks and Romans sometimes abolished kinershiD 
but they never established a (democratic republic, or a ration- 
al system of representative government. 

The government of the family too, in early times, was 
despotic. The power of the husband over his wife, and of 
the father over his child, was/unlimited. The wife and child 
were both property. The father sold his daughter, and the 



20 

husband bought his wife. If a man did not like his wife, 
the law permitted him to turn her away, or suggested a 
method by which, under the form of a trial, he might remove 
her out of existence. If a man wished for more wives than 
one, and was able to purchase or steal them, he was at liberty 
to have any number up to a hundred or a thousand. The 
woman had no choice with regard to her husband ; she was 
wholly at the disposal of her Father. Yet she was required 
to obey her husband in all things, and to leave to him the 
disposal both of herself and her children. It was only in 
peculiar cases that she was allowed to hold property, and 
she was denied the pleasures and advantages of a rational 
education. 

So with regard to tl*B father and the child. The father 
could either sell his children into slavery, or put, them to 
death. Some legal restrictions were at length laid on the 
power of the father, but they were neither adapted nor per- 
haps intended, really to deprive him of his fearful power. 
So long as laws are made and administered by husbands and 
parents alone, it is vain, in rude and uncivilized times, to 
expect that justice will be done to wives and children. 

How do we stand now with regard to those matters ? All 
is changed. The doctrine of the divine right of kings is ex- 
ploded, and rulers are regarded as but men. If they raise 
their heads too high, the people cut them off. If they refuse 
to rule according to law, the people banish them. Sooner 
than allow their rulers to treat them with insolence, every 
civilized nation on earth would send their rulers to heaven, 
or somewhere else. They may allow their rulers to retain 
the old titles of king or emperor, but not the power or pri- 
vileges which those names implied in earlier times. Some 
of the nations in Europe, tho' monarchies in name, arc more 
than one half republican in reality. The tendency of all is 
to a virtual democracy, and in some that blessing is already 
realized. 

Domestic government also is changed for the better. 
The power of the father to torture or destroy his son has 



21 

been long since taken away in all civilized nations. Sons 
have now rights as well as fathers, and both the laws and 
public sentiment guard those rights. Even Daughters have 
rights. They are not yet placed on a level with their 
brothers, but the father can no longer force his daughter 
to marry the man she hates, nor can he keep her from marry- 
ing 4 the m'an she loves. The unreasonable creatures try 
sometimes, but .they cannot do it. 

Nor can the husband do exactly as he likes with his wife, 
unless, like a husband of the model kind, he never chooses 
to do any thing but what is exactly right. He cannot have 
her, in the first place, without her consent; and when he has 
gained her consent, he cannot turn her adrift without a just 
cause, duly proved in open Court. He cannot take more 
than one with impunity, unless he go a little further West, 
and cross the Rocky Mountains ; and even then he might not 
be allowed to have every thing his own way for ever. If 
the wife be grievously ill-treated, the laws grant the right 
of divorce. They even acknowledge her right to property, 
and provide for her education, to some extent. And the 
spirit of the age is becoming daily more and more in her 
favor. 

"We have made progress in religion. The most civilized 
nations of antiquity regarded as sacred, opinions the most 
absurd and blasphemous; and they practised as religious 
duties, deeds the most cruel and revolting. The beings or 
phantoms that they worshipped as Gods, were frequently 
remarkable for nothing so much as vice and cruelty. And 
what they believed thoir Gods were accustomed to do, they 
naturally enough supposed it lawful for themselves to do. 
Bacchus was a drunkard, Mercury a thief, Mars a murderer, 
and Jove a brute; and why should not tlwy have license to 
be the same ? 

Most of the religions of antiquity required human sacri- 
fices. A father was required to sacrifice his son, or to offer 



22 

his daughter as a burnt offering. Laws were regarded as 
divine, which sanctioned the grossest crimes ; and if we may 
believe the histories which the ancient Jews have transmit- 
ted to us respecting their fathers, polygamy, incest, concu- 
binage, and even more revolting vices, were practised by 
their best and wisest men. 

We grant that many of the religions of the present day 
are foolish and demoralizing enough, but they are no longer 
the religions of the most advanced of our race. They are 
the religions of the unthinking and unreasoning only. The 
better portions of mankind have outgrown them. 

We have progressed in the arts. We will say nothing of 
the fine arts, though we think it might be easily demonstra- 
ted, that at no former period were the arts of sculpture and 
painting carried to such perfection as in modern times. 
It is past dispute that there is no comparison between the 
oldest specimens of painting and sculpture, and the produc- 
tions of later times. The specimens of ancient Egyptian 
and Assyrian art resemble the specimens which we see on 
the Buffalo robes brought down to us by the Omahas and 
Pawnees. As to music, the improvements which have taken 
place in it, are incalculable. What it was in earlier ages, 
among the Egyptians, the Jews, the earlier Greeks and 
Romans, as well as among our early German and Celtic an- 
cestors, one may judge from what it is now among the native 
Indians. What it is now, whether one regard the science or 
the art — the endless variety and diversified powers of music- 
al instruments, or the wonderful perfection to which that 
most charming of all musical organs has been carried, the 
voice of man and woman, would take a musical philosopher 
to describe. Perhaps the best way to impress ourselves with 
the immeasurable progress which we have made in music, 
would be to spend a morning in listening to a Pawnee drum 
and its vocal accompaniment, and the evening in attending 
a joint concert got up by Julien, Ole Bull and Jenny Lind. 

But it is of what are called the useful arts, including the 



23 

common arts of life, which are hardly dignified with the 
name of arts, that we would particularly speak. Here our 
progress has been not only vast and rapid, but of a nature 
that all can understand and appreciate. 

Take first the art of travelling. Our first progenitors 
trudged on foot, thro' uncleared thickets, and undrained 
swamps, and over unbridged streams; and the man of 
swiftest foot was the courier or messenger of his tribe. 
Their posterity tamed the ass, the camel and the horse, thus 
doubling their speed, and leaving the swift-footed runner 
panting wearily behind. On rivers, lakes, and narrow seas 
they came, in course of ages, to paddle the primitive canoe. 
Another long succession of ages passed, and man invented 
sails, and pressed the winds into his service. On land he 
rumbled along in his rude wagon, drawn by the slow- footed 
ox. A few centuries pass, and he invents the chariot, and 
harnesses the horse, and drives along, where the roads will 
permit, at the rate of four or five miles an hour. Then 
came, in slow succession, the old stage coach with wooden 
springs ; the improved stage coach with leathern springs ; 
the patent flying coach with metal springs; the mail, with 
relays of horses, change of drivers, and stated times of 
departure and arrival, and better roads, and bridges over 
streams, and a man traveled fifty, sixty, or a hundred miles 
a day. He improves his ships, and crosses the widest oceans, 
making five or six knots an hour. And thus things stood 
when we were young. IIow stand they now? Oar roads 
are iron, our horses iron ; and we travel at our ease, in 
cushioned chairs, with book or newspaper in hand, at the 
rate of thirty, forty, and in some cases, sixty and seventy 
miles an hour. Forty years ago it took three weeks, some- 
times, to pass from Liverpool to Dublin. Now you perform 
the voyage in steamships in six or eight hours, We lime 
mastered the winds and the waves. We travel up the rapid 
streams of the Mississippi and Missouri, faster than our 
fathers could travel down them. We transport our mer- 



24 

chandise as rapidly as ourselves. The plodding pack-horse, 
and the heavy lumbering wagon, and the snail-paced canal 
boat, have transferred their charge to the steam-boat and 
the lightning train, and disappeared. Fifty years [ago, 
the man who undertook to travel 200 or 300 miles, made 
his will before starting, and took a long and sad farewell of 
all he left behind. Men now take such journeys daily, and 
after doing their business, come home to breakfast the next 
morning. -, 

As another instance, take the art of writing. Our earlier 
ancestors, if they wrote at all, wrote slowly on lead, or on the 
rock, with pens of iron. Their words were pictures. Let- 
ters they had none. Letters came, however, at length, and 
men wrote more rapidly, on wax, on bark, on parchment, 
and on leaves of plants. At length paper was invented, 
and writing became easier and more rapid still, and books 
could then be had by the very rich. But we stop not here. 
Man's course is ever onward. He invents the printing 
press, and writes ten thousand words at once by one strong 
pull of his arm. The man is suspected of dealing with the 
devil, he produces books so fast, as if any devil with common 
sense, would ever help a respectable printer. Books now 
are multiplied by thousands. Presses work everywhere. — 
But the demand for books increases, and it must be met, — 
The power that had been made to drag the railway cars 
and impel the steamships is set to work the printing press, 
and it works it admirably. A man now can print in a day, 
what twenty men could not have written in a life-time in 
the days of our fathers. 

Take as another example, the art of correspondence. Ou r 
forefathers sent messengers; we send messages. They 
walked; we fly. They gave signals from mountain to moun- 
tain by night fires; we talk to each other over islands and 
continents, and across seas and oceans, by lightning. The 
lightning Las been taught to speak and write, and messages 
from New York to New Orleans, and from Europe to Amer- 



25 

ica, which it would once have taken the courier or the ship 
six weeks or six months to carry, and the tamed lightning 
transmits in the twinkling of an eye. 

We have made progress in Agriculture, both as a science 
and an art. We know more of soils and manures, of the re- 
lations of vegetation to the air, of the capabilities and laws 
of improvement in stock and fruit and grain, and of every 
thing concerning agriculture, than our fathers knew. And 
we have better methods of doing our work. We have better 
implements. Our fathers reaped with the sickle, at the rate 
of half or quarter an acre a day. We reap with horses and 
machinery, at the rate of an acre or two an hour. They 
trod out their grain with oxen, then beat it out with the 
flail; we thrash with machinery, a bushel a minute. They 
sowed with the hand, we with the ten-mouthed drill. 

We have progressed in manufactures. 

Take the art of spinning for instance. Our grandmothers 
used to spin a thread at a time, and thought a pound of yarn 
a good day's work. We spin by steam, two thousand threads 
at a time, and a hundred men can spin yarn enough for a 
nation. 

In the days of our fathers, the weaver threw his shuttle 
with the hand; now it is thrown by steam. Steam does 
almost every thing. It thrashes grain, grinds flour. It 
bores mountains, digs wells, and quarries stone. It saws 
lumber, works forges, makes shoes, knits socks, rocks cradles, 
makes pills and prints books. 

The beneficial results of this progress in science and art, 
in Government and religion, are innumerable. 

We have fewer famines than our ancestors, and those 
which we have are less severe. We produce more food. 
We are more provident, and keep more on hand: thus making 
the surplus productions of one year, supply the deficiency 
of another. Nations have more commercial intercourse 
with each other, so that the abundance of one country is 



26 

more easily obtained to supply the wants of others. No- 
thing like the famines of antiquity has ever afflicted this 
country, it is probable that it has never once entered into your 
minds to fear a calamity, which, in other lands, and in less 
favored times, used often to embitter, with its pangs and ter- 
rors, the lives of our ancestors. 

We have fewer wars than our forefathers, and those we 
have, are less destructive. We have fewer kings, and those 
which remain cannot so easily engage their subjects in war 
as formerly. Men are getting wiser, so that war is coming 
to be a game that kings cannot so easily play at as for- 
merly. 

There are fewer great conflagrations than formerly. Cities 
are better built, and in most countries there are better 
means of extinguishing fires, or checking their ravages. 

We have fewer visitations of the plague, and those we 
have are much less severe. 

We are less troubled with superstition than formerly. 
Many horrible superstitions which used to torment the souls 
of our ancestors have disappeared, and those which remain 
are confined chiefly to the uneducated portions of society. 
We have no more any trials or executions for witchcraft. 
Less than two hundred years ago the people of New Eng- 
land were hanging and burning their neighbors wholesale 
on charges of witchcraft, and the whole country was tortured 
with the most horrible and maddening fears. There was 
scarcely a family that felt itself secure. Those who were 
not afraid of being plagued or destroyed by the devil and 
the witches, were in danger of being executed by the 
authorities on charges of witchcraft, and all the more in 
danger for not believing in the thing. Things were as bad 
in other countries. In many cities of Germany six hundred 
persons were burnt, or hung, or otherwise executed, annually) 
on charges of witchcraft. In the town of Geneva five hun- 
dred persons were burned alive in two years. Cumanus 



27 

( 

burned forty-one poor women in one province of Italy, and 
Sprenger, in Germany, burned a number which cannot be 
ascertained. The more they burned, the more they found 
to burn; until it became a common prayer with women in 
the humbler walks of life, that they might never live to 
grow old. It was sufficient to be old and poor, to insure 
death at the stake or on the scaffold. 

The old were not, however, the only victims to this hor- 
rible delusion. Young girls, and men and women in the 
prime of life were frequently sacrificed. Whole families, 
fathers, mothers, and children, were burnt together. The 
panic became so severe at times, that there were not judges 
enough to try the cases, nor dungeons sufficient to hold 'the 
prisoners. • N 

The same melancholy delusions worked similar mischiefs 
in England and Scotland. Besides vast numbers who were 
publicly executed, many women lost their lives, in every 
part of the country, without being brought to trial at all, 
from the injuries received at the hands of the people. Life 
became so intolerable to many, who were never brought be- 
fore a court, that they actually confessed themselves guilty 
of witchcraft, for the purpose of getting themselves put out 
of their misery. Sir George Mackenzie, Lcrd Advocate of 
Scotland, himself a believer in witchcraft, mentions several 
such cases. He says, "I went to examine some women 
who had confessed, and one of them told me, under secrecy, 
that she had not confessed because she was guilty, but being 
a poor creature who worked for her meat, she saw, that 
having been defamed for a witch, she should starve, for no 
person after that would give her meat and lodging, and thai 
all men would heather and set dogs at her; and that there- 
fore she desired to be out of the world; and with that she 
wept most bitterly." 

One way of ascertaining whether people were witches or 
not, was to throw them into deep waters. If they Sink, it was 
taken as a proof that tbey were not witches; but then the 



28 

poor creatures weie drowned. If they did not sink, it was 
considered proof conclusive that they were witches, and they 
were accordingly destroyed. Guilty or not guilty the result 
was death. 

People were charged with witchcraft on the most mon- 
strous grounds, and convicted on the most ridiculous testi- 
mony. The testimony against some was that they had 
made their neighbors' cattle barren, or their milch cows dry ; 
against others that they afflicted their neighbors' children 
with mysterious pains, or incurable diseases. If persons 
were ready to swear that such a person was afflicted, or such 
a mau's cattle ill, and that the unfortunate person at the bar 
* was a witch, and supposed to be the cause of the calamity, 
it was enough. Two proor old women at Constance were 
put to the torture, and then convicted and burned, on a charge 
of having raised a tempest. For a period of thirty-nine 
years the average number of persons who were executed on 
such charges in Scotland alone, was two hundred annually, 
or upwards of seven thousand altogether. As late as 1664, 
Sir Matthew Hale, so renowned for his incorruptibility and 
piety, condemned two women to the stake as witches; and 
the last execution on a charge of witchcraft took place in 
England as late as the year 1716. At that time a woman 
and hor daughter, the daughter only nine years of age, were 
hanged on a charge of selling their souls to the Devil, and 
raising a tempest by pulling off their stockings and making 
a lather of soap. Now that Science has dissipated these hor- 
rible delusions, we look back on the frightful and monstrous 
tragedies enacted by our forefathers, with astonishment, hor- 
ror and pity. 

Our ancestors were great believers in fairies, and mothers 
frequently imagined that their children had been carried off 
by the mischievous elves, and others left in their place. But 
how seldom we hear of a changeling now. 

Fifty years ago there was not a town or village in the old 
world without its haunted houses, where ghosts of murdered 



29 

men and women made dreadful noises, frightening almost to 
death or madness, those who were rash or unfortunate 
enough to pass a night in them. This plague also has gradu- 
ally diminished as natural science has made its way among 
the people. Neither witches, ghosts, nor devils, seem to 
like the light of science. 

We have fewer revolting kinds of punishment than for- 
merly. Burning men at the stake, breaking them on the 
wheel, rending thern in pieces by horses, hanging or nailing 
them on crosses, and even the lesser cruelties of maiming 
and branding, are almost wholly unknown in the present day, 
except in slave states, and even hanging and branding are 
less common than they used to be. In the reign of Henry 
the Eighth, renowned for the murder of so many wives, and 
for so many quarrels with the popedom, more than seventy 
thousand persons were hung, many of them on the charge of 
vagrancy alone. In the present age the reign of an English 
monarch will hardly be dishonored with a hundredth part 
that number of executions, tho' the population of the coun- 
try is three or four times greater. 

We have less religious cruelty than formerly. Persecu- 
tion for differences of opinion on religious subjects used to 
be more common than hanging for vagrancy, or burning 
for witchcraft The Jews stoned or stabbed each other, 
the Gentiles crucified and burnt the Jews; and both Jews 
and Gentiles occupied themselves occasionally in destroying 
the Christians. As soon as the Christians got the power, 
they began to burn the Gentiles and each other. Arians 
burnt Athanasians, and Athanasians burnt Arians; Catho- 
lics burnt Protestants, and Protestants burnt Catholics. 
Th^n Protestants fell on each other, and church-men mur- 
dered Independents and IQrsbyterians, and Presbyterians 
and Congregationalista murdered Baptists and Quakers. 
Trinitarians murdered Unitarians, and nil the orthod 
joined together to save the souls, by tormenting and 



30 

destroying the bodies, of such as had the happiness or mis- 
fortune to agree with none of them. The numbers who 
have been crucified, burnt, torn in pieces, thrown to wild 
beasts, broken on the rack, hung, beheaded, or slain with 
the sword, or driven out of the world by torture and starva- 
tion, for religion's sake, exceeds all calculation. This hor- 
rible system of butchery for the support and promotion of 
piety, is now generally abandoned. Persecution has not 
ceased, but it has assumed a milder form. Instead of de- 
stroying men's bodies, orthodoxy now contents itself with 
destroying their reputations. Instead of fining heretics, it 
only tries to keep them so poor that they shall have nothing 
with which to pay a fine. Instead of banishing people, it 
only tries to make the place where they live so hot, that 
they shall be glad to banish themselves. Instead of send- 
ing them to the scaffold or the stake, they mercifully hand 
them over to the dark gentleman with so many vulgar 
names, to be conveyed to the warmest apartments in his 
magnificent and gorgeously illumined palace. These, of 
course, are trifles compared with the portion which misgui- 
ded zeal and perverted charity would once have dealt out to 
such as happened to be wiser or better than their neigh- 
bors. 

Even religion itself is laying aside many of its more 
obnoxious and revolting doctrines and practices. It was 
once a common thing to preach of infant damnation, 
and to refuse to children dying before Baptism, the right 
of decent burial. It was the custom, not thirty years ago, to 
preach the horrid doctrines of eternal, unconditional elec- 
tion and reprobation, the most revolting notions respecting 
the divine sovereignty and almighty partiality and caprice, 
impossible theories of the trinity, atonement, original sin, 
total depravity, supernatural conversion, salvation by faith 
alone, a literal day of judgment, and all the horrors of a 
lire and brimstone hell, and eternal and infinite torments, 
for the greater portion of mankind. It was also the custom 



31 

to give such interpretations of the Bible, as made its 
teachings clash with the revelations of science. Tales of 
dreadful judgments inflicted on men of unapproved opin- 
ions, and of miraculous interpositions in behalf of believers 
of the right stamp, used to abound in religious magazines 
and newspapers. All such things are gradually becoming 
less common. Eeligious denominations are also becoming 
more tolerant and charitable towards each other, and some 
of them are beginning to show less bitterness towards such 
as differ from all religious sects. 

If time would permit, it would be easy to show that 
drunkenness and gambling, frequent as they are, are neither 
so common nor so fashionable as they once were. For- 
merly intemperance ruled, and the man w T ho would not get 
drunk occasionally, was banished from respectable society. 
Now, Temperance is getting the upperhand, and many, 
instead of boasting of drunkenness, will hardly acknowledge 
the charge when preferred against them, but contend that 
they were only elevated or disguised. 

There is less political corruption than formerly. Not a 
hundred years ago, offices and honors, and titles and power, 
and justice, — nay, not justice, but Judgments, in criminal 
as well as in political and civil suits, were regularly sold 
in the most powerful nations of Europe. Now, corruption 
is not only less frequent, but less outrageous. 

There is immensely less serfdom and slavery in the world 
than formerly. At one time serfdom and slavery were all 
but universal. Now they are confined to a few countries, 
and in some of these they are gradually dying out. Where 
they prevail, they are accompanied with less cruelty than 
formerly. In no country now would men be permitted, 
even if they were so disposed, to treat their serfs or slave- 
as the Ancient Greeks and Romans frequently treated 
theirs, or even as the Egyptians and the Jews are repre- 
sented as treating their bondmen and bondwomen. The 
heart of our common humanity is too tender to tolerate 
such enormities. 



32 

There is immensely less ignorance in the world than for- 
merly, as well as less crnelty. Not fifteen hundred years 
ago there were powerful nations, — many powerful nations, 
who gloried in their ignorance, and made exterminating 
war on books and learning. Not a thousand years ago 
there were mighty nations who. were thus proud and 
boastful of their ignorance and barbarism. Nay, not yet 
two hundred years ago, historians assure us, that even in 
England, men of large estates, and filling offices of trust 
in their own counties, were not only brutally ignorant, 
but congratulated themselves on their ignorance. About 
the same time it was the boast of a governor of Virginia, 
that there were neither common schools nor newspapers 
in that colony. Science was held in contempt, or regarded 
with suspicion and dread, by the puritans, on both sides 
of the Atlantic. A few ages earlier it was difficult to 
find a man in a whole county that could even read, ex- 
cept here and there a priest, Even long after the estab- 
lishment of Protestantism there were numbers of clergy- 
men who could not even read their prayer books. Now 
education is becoming general in all the countries of 
Europe, and here it is all but universal. 

We are far in advance of the ancients in regard to litera- 
ture. Our literature, I mean our best literature, is more 
truthful. Of course what the ancients did not know, they 
could not teach, while the errors which were mingled with 
their better thoughts, often formed the principal part of their 
writings. Our literature is more abundant too than that of 
the ancients. On every subject of importance we have a 
hundred good works, where they had one. It is more vari- 
ous also. It treats of a thousand subjects of which they had 
no conception. It is, besides, more progressive, more re- 
formatory. And it is more chaste, more pure. The princi- 
pal poets of antiquity have faults that would not be tole- 
rated in a poet of the present day. 

We have better works in every department of literature 
than the ancients had. Wc have better histories and better 



_ 



38 

biographies. We have better poetry and better fictions. — 
We have better works on logic and rhetoric. We have 
better treatises on science, on morals, on religion, on gov- 
ernment, and on law. We have better songs and better 
dramas. Antiquity has nothing to compare with Charles 
Mackay, or William Shakespeare. Literature is more dif- 
fused too than formerly. It is cultivated by a far greater 
number of nations, and by far greater numbers in each 
nation ; and an infinitely greater number of men and 
women enjoy the pleasures and advantages of literature. 
Books are much more numerous than formerly, and much 
cheaper ; and greater numbers of persons have means to 
buy, and time to read good books. 

I grant that in some respects the books of some of the 
ancients can hardly be excelled. There is something in 
Homer and Virgil, in Horace and Ovid, exquisitely beauti- 
ful, and indiscribably charming ; and there is something in 
the speeches of Cicero and Demosthenes irresistibly power- 
ful. And in Aristotle, and Plato, and Cicero, and Seneca, 
there is a vast amount both of good sense and beautiful 
writing. And Herodotus and Xenophon, and Plutarch and 
Livy, have left us a number of exquisitely finished compo- 
sitions, call them history or fiction, which you will. It 
would be false and unjust to deny that the ancients have 
great excellencies, and excellencies peculiar to themselves. 
But for truthfulness and variety, and power to elevate 
and bless mankind, the literature of the ancients is far, — 
very far behind the better kind of literature of the present 
day. 

And the farther we go back, the fewer and the poorer the 
books become. Everything becomes poorer. Government?, 
laws, religions, arts, — all dwindle. 

If we go back still further, we reach a period when men 
had no books at all, not even of the poorest kind, — when 
they had no written language,— no letters, — when sounds 
had no signs, — when the thought! and feelings, the words 



34 

and deeds of men had no record, no memorial, save in the 
mind, and but seldom there. A period when men had no 
science, no arts, no monuments, — no Governments, no 
institutions, no laws, — when they had no homes, no 
flocks, no fields, — no cultivated grain, or fruits, — when 
they roamed the forest in savage freedom, gathering acorns, 
nuts and roots, or ensnaring birds and beasts for food, and, 
dying, left no trace of their existence behind. 

We go back still farther and there is no man, not even a 
hunter or a savage. The earth is in possession of the birds 
and beasts, insects and reptiles ; they are its only inhabi- 
tants. The sheep has no shepherd, the horse no rider, the 
dog no master. Among a thousand sounds with which the 
hills and forests ring, there is no voice of man ; no shout of 
joy, no song of love, no sound of merry children. The 
earth, so far as humanity is concerned,is one great solitude. 
Birds sing, but no ear listens to their songs, flowers bloom 
but no eye gazes on their beauties ; fruits ripen, but no one 
tastes their sweetness. 

"Then every flower was born to blush unseen, 
And waste its sweetness on the desert air. " 

We go still farther back and there are none of our present 
races of animals. The birds and the beasts with which we 
are now familiar, all disappear. Instead of the horse, the 
dog, the sheep, — the dove, the eagle and the lark, huge and 
unsightly beasts and birds of other races crowd the 
earth. 

We go still farther back and even these disappear, and 
there is not a living thing on all the earth. Silence and 
stillness reign thro' all her realms ; the silence of death, 
the stillness of the grave. The forests are untrod; the 
plains untenanted. The hills and the valleys are all deso- 
late. Not an insect buzzes in the air ; not a reptile crawls 
upon the ground. There is no life, no voice, no sound of 
living thing on all the earth. Trees bud and spread their 
leaves, flowers bloom and fade, winds blow, storms rage, 
showers Hill and vapors rise, day comes and goes, suns rise 



36 

and set, moons wax and wane, stars shine, and seasons 
change, seas ebb and flow, the lightnings flash, and thun- 
ders roar, valleys rise, and mountains fall, and fierce convul- 
sions shake and rend the globe; but no eye gazes on the 
scene, no ear listens, no heart feels; but one unbroken des- 
olation broods over all. 

We go still farther back and we reach a period when even 
vegetation disappears, and nothing but a bare and barren 
earth remains. The hills and plains have not a tree, a herb, 
or flower; not a fern, a moss, or a lichen. The Globe is a 
naked, bald, unvarying waste. The elements rage in fierce 
eternal conflict; fire-mists and furious tempests sweep 
along ; all is one scene of tumult, rage, confusion. And 
thus the earth remained thro' countless, measureless, unim- 
aginable periods. 

Would we know, then, the progress which the earth and 
man have made, we must measure the distance from 
this dreary point " in the far backward and abyss of time, " 
to the point where now we stand, surrounded with infinite 
varieties and countless multitudes of living creatures, 
enriched with the innumerable and invaluable advantages 
of science and civilization, and all the blessings and endear- 
ments of peaceful homes and cultivated society. We must 
calculate the difference between all that is, and the blank 
and dreary desolation of the far-off past, and this will be 
the measure of the progress which the earth and man have 
made. 

And still we progress. 

We progress faster than heretofore. 

We have fewer obstacles to progress. 

We have more helps. 

And greater numbers are engaging in aiding the work 
of progri 

And progress is still bestowing fresh blessings on our 
race, thus luring us ever onward. 

Jt is extending the hounds < f Bcien 



36 



LIBRPRY OF CONGRESS 



000 851 837 3 



It is elevatinsr man's character. 

It is improving his condition. 

It is promoting peace find charity, and bringing men 
into closer and happier relations with each other. And it 
promises ultimately to join all ranks and all nations in 
bonds of eternal amity. 



There's a good time coming. 

The pen shall supersede the sword, 
And right, not might, shall be the lord, 

In the good time coming. 
Worth, not birth, shall rule mankind 

And be acknowledged stronger; 
The proper impulse has been given ; 
Wait a little longer. 
There's a good time coming; a good time coming. 
Hateful rivalries of creed 

Shall not make their martyrs bleed, 
In the good time coming. 
Religion shall be shorn of pride, 
And virtue shall wax stronger , 
And charity shall trim her lamp, 
Wait a little longer. 



Then let us pray, that come it may, 

As come it shall for a' that, 
When sense and worth, o'er a' the earth 

Shall bear the sway, and a' that, 
For a' that, and a' that, 

It's coming yet for a' that, 
When man and man, the wide world o'er 

bhall brothers be, and a' that. 



Amen. 



CB I 56 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

III II! Ill llll 



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